Objects, nostalgia and the Dutch colonial elite in times of transition, ca. 1900-1970

Abstract

This article analyses the role of the changing meanings of material objects in processes of identification, inclusion, and exclusion of people in the (former) colony and the Netherlands between 1900 and 1970. It reveals how and why people and nation-states relate to history, and to the Dutch colonial past in particular. I will argue that objects collected by the European colonial elite and the nostalgic feelings they evoked could be powerful instruments for people's social well-being and for the social standing of this particular social group in both the (former) colony and the Netherlands.